1. Unit1 GOD: AND TRUE HAPPINESS

2. The Young and the Restless Human Heart  Everyone wants to be loved and appreciated, to be recognized and feel happy  God would also like this for you as well…but…  You will never experience full happiness until you are with God  In addition, all other types of happiness are temporary because they are impermanent  God wants you to come back to Him and as such our hearts are restless for God  Once we are with God, our hearts will finally be satisfied

3. Cont.  Nothing in this life will be able to fully make one perfectly happy. God gave us a hunger for happiness in which God can only fulfill.

4. Questioning Minds  It is extremely important to question one’s faith  To live in our faiths without questioning is ignorant  God wants us to question our faith so we can find the answers  When we find our answers it will strengthen our bond with God and we can see some of God’s plan  It is impossible to comprehend all that God plans, but we can come to appreciate and have faith that this plan is for the greater good.

5. We are religious by nature  Human beings are naturally religious  We have always sought the truth in all different types of disciplines (ie. Science)  We naturally want to know our origins and what the meaning of life is, by doing so we are also trying to find our creator and our purpose.  This purpose is to be with God, and therefore, makes us religious because we are seeking a higher power or a divine answer to our questions

6. Mono vs. Poly The three major western religions are: Judaism, Christianity, and Islam and each believe in one God, which makes them monotheistic Major eastern religions are: Hinduism, Buddhism, and Indigenous and believes that there are many gods, which makes them polytheistic

7. Knowing God through Revelation  When contemplating religion, many will ask, well where is your proof that there is a God?  The answer lies in Natural Revelation, which refers to how God, through nature and the order of things reveals Himself to us (even though some of us may not know it)  These are clearly seen in the St. Thomas Aquinas’ “Five Proofs of Existence.”

8. Show me your proof  1. Unmoved Mover: the world is in motion, for the world to move, there must have been a “first mover” who started everything, that mover is God. (ex. The boulder and the hill)  2. First Cause: Nothing causes itself, something must have triggered a series of events, if you trace it all back to the beginning, you will be able to see a first cause, that cause is God (ex. Big Bang Theory).  3. Everything Comes from Something: “Nothing” can create “Something” For something to exist, there must be a being (God) who always existed and brought other beings into existence.

9. Cont.  4. Supreme Model: we can all see degrees of perfection (goodness, truth, justice, beauty, etc.) We only know this because we are comparing it to absolute perfection, the perfect form, this perfect form is God (ie. Plato’s chair)  5. Grand Designer: If you look at how the world operates and flows, you will see that there had to a design, that designer must have know how this world needs to work together in order to exist. That designer is God (ie. Human body)

10. Always look on the Bright Side of Life  What is the meaning of life: To be one with God  God provides glimpses on this world of what life would be like with Him, and thus provides us the meaning of life in 3 themes  1. Beauty and Truth: Experiences of joy in the presence of beauty and intellectual completeness in the face of truth are hints of what God’s has in store for us. (ie. Holding a baby, a gorgeous sunset)  2. Moral Goodness, Personal Conscience, and Justice: we all have conscience that tells us right from wrong, we want good, and reject evil naturally. This is why we get upset with those who cheat, or kill innocent people. We have this innate sense of what is wrong behavior and seek justice for these actions. (being accountable for ones’ actions)

11. Cont.  3. Love and Intelligence: Love and intelligence are things that cannot be explained by a material universe. They come from a Supreme Being that gave us these gifts, and therefore the Supreme Being must have created these gifts.

12. “I can’t believe it’s not butter, err…I meant God”  Some people refuse to see the suffering in the world.  Others look at the sins of believers and are shocked that anyone could believe in a loving God, and let these terrible things happen.  Some simply choose to reject God  Lastly, some are afraid that if they begin to believe, that they will have to change their ways  Original Sin has weakened our minds and hearts so that we fail to perceive and follow the truth

13. Divine Revelation and a Garden of Eve-vil  This refers to instances in history in which God Himself has actively interacted with humans  Many people believe that God created the world and then just abandoned us to fend for ourselves, and we’ve made a mess out of it  Take for instance Genesis, God creates paradise and leaves humans to rule over it, as we know, our vanity, shame and guilt brought that to a swift end, and now we must toil and work for a living.

14. However!  God frequently interacts with humans in history to help steer us in a better path  1. Covenant with Noah: The Flood was punishment for prideful ambition, God makes a covenant with every living creation that he never will destroy the earth with a flood. The purpose is to unify all of God’s people into one family  2. Covenant with Abraham: God promised Abraham many descendants, these descendants would only have one God. Circumcision is the sign that these were God’s people (Chosen People)

15. Cont.  3. Covenant with Moses, The Sinai Covenant: Israelites are freed from slavery and given the 10 Commandments. Rules that will govern their actions in life. God promises these people the Promised Land. God also reveals his name YHWH (“I Am Who Am”), which reveals that He is the source of all that is.  4. Jesus Christ, the New Covenant: God is made flesh, and lived among us on Earth, teaching us about how to be with God in heaven.

16. Where do we go from here  After JC left us, we were charged with the duty of spreading His word to the people and bringing them closer to God. This was done through Sacred Tradition and Sacred Scripture.  Tradition means “handing down” and therefore the Apostles were entrusted to keep this sacred tradition and “hand down” the teachings to the people. All of the apostles except St. John were martyred. They taught the people to repent and to be one with God.  Scripture is the written form of what the Apostles taught and handed down. This is combined into what we know as the Bible (aka. Books) and the authors of the Bible were inspired by God